Bottled Water Recall Tracker: What Is Actually Recalled Right Now

Quick answer As of August 16, 2026, one bottled water recall is active in the United States: Valley Springs Artesian Gold, LLC of Portage, Wisconsin recalled 651,148 units across three recall numbers on February 6, 2026, because the water was bottled under insanitary conditions. It is a Class II recall, still listed as ongoing, and distribution was limited to Illinois and Wisconsin. Every other recent bottled water recall, including Meijer distilled water and Topo Chico, has been terminated. No national brand is currently under an active recall.

Bottled water recalls are rarer than social media suggests, and the ones that do happen are usually small, regional and quietly resolved. That gap between perceived risk and actual risk is why this page exists. We pull directly from the FDA enforcement database rather than from news aggregators, so what you see here is the federal record.

How we built this page. Every recall below was pulled from the FDA’s openFDA food enforcement API, the structured dataset behind the agency’s public enforcement reports. We queried it directly rather than relying on news coverage, checked each record’s status field to confirm whether it is ongoing or terminated, and cross-checked the widely-searched claims in the debunked section against the same database. Where a claim has no record, we say so rather than filling the gap with an estimate. Last verified against the database on August 16, 2026.

Is there a bottled water recall right now?

Yes, one. It is regional and it is not a household brand.

Valley Springs Artesian Gold, LLC, based in Portage, Wisconsin, initiated a voluntary recall on February 6, 2026. The FDA classified it on February 26 as Class II. All three recall numbers share a single event ID, meaning they stem from one underlying problem at one facility.

Recall number	Product	Units	Status
H-0534-2026	Valley Springs 100% Natural Bottled Water (1 gal, 2.5 gal), Infant Water, Daisy’s Doggy Water	379,868	Ongoing
H-0536-2026	Valley Springs Steamed Distilled Water, 1 gal / 128 fl oz	263,440	Ongoing
H-0535-2026	Valley Springs 100% Natural Bottled Water, Fluoride Added, 1 gal	7,840	Ongoing

The stated reason on all three records is identical and blunt: “Water was bottled under insanitary conditions.” The code information field reads All Codes, which matters more than it might appear. There is no batch number to check and no best-by date that clears you. Every unit is covered.

Published UPCs: 0 31193-00701 9 (1 gal Natural), 0 31193-01501 4 (2.5 gal), 0 31193-01401 7 (Infant Water), 0 31193-90100 3 (Daisy’s Doggy Water), 0 31193-01301 0 (Fluoride Added), 0 31193-00601 2 (Steamed Distilled).

Worth knowing: the largest of the three recalls includes Infant Water, whose label states “Not sterile. Use as directed by physician or by labeling directions for use of infant formula.” Water sold for mixing formula sits in a different risk category than general drinking water, because infants have less developed immune defences and consume a large volume relative to body weight. If you are in Illinois or Wisconsin and have Valley Springs Infant Water at home, do not use it, regardless of the code on the jug.

What bottled water has been recalled recently?

Here is the full recent record, newest first. Note how few there are, and how many are already terminated.

Date	Brand	Reason	Class	Where	Status
Feb 2026	Valley Springs Artesian Gold	Bottled under insanitary conditions	II	IL, WI	Ongoing
Nov 2025	Meijer Steam Distilled Water	Floating black foreign substance	II	IL, IN, KY, OH, MI, WI	Terminated
Jun 2025	LION Spring Water Hydration Drinks	Potential floating objects	III	TN only	Terminated
May 2025	Topo Chico Mineral Water	Pseudomonas; held product shipped in error	II	AZ, LA, NM, NV, TX	Completed
Sep 2024	Berkeley Springs Water	Tested positive for coliforms	III	WV, MD, VA	Terminated
Mar 2024	Fiji Natural Artesian Water	Manganese plus three bacterial genera	III	WA and online nationwide	Terminated
Nov 2023	Waiakea Hawaiian Volcanic Water	Floating particles	II	9 states	Terminated
Jul 2023	Zephyrhills Spring Water	Bromate above the 10 ppb limit	III	Domestic	Terminated

The Fiji recall is the one most people remember. It covered 78,533 cases, roughly 1.9 million bottles, sold through Amazon. It was Class III, the lowest risk tier, and the FDA record names manganese and three bacterial genera without identifying which genera. It terminated in November 2024.

The Meijer recall is the answer to a question a lot of people are typing. It covered 38,043 gallons across exactly six states, for a floating black substance, and it terminated in March 2026.

What does a Class II recall actually mean?

The FDA sorts recalls into three classes by potential harm, using this wording in 21 CFR 7.3.

Class	FDA definition	In practice
Class I	A reasonable probability that use will cause serious adverse health consequences or death	The serious tier. Rare for water.
Class II	Use may cause temporary or medically reversible adverse health consequences, or the probability of serious consequences is remote	Where most water recalls land.
Class III	Use is not likely to cause adverse health consequences	Usually technical or labelling violations.

Class is about risk, not scale. Fiji’s 1.9 million bottles were Class III. The only Class I bottled water recall in the modern FDA record is Real Water in 2021, after the FDA was notified of cases of acute liver failure. Five Nevada children aged seven months to five years were hospitalised, and laboratory analysis never identified the causative contaminant. The company ceased operations under a consent decree.

Which bottled water recalls do people ask about that never happened?

Several recall claims circulate widely and have no matching record in the federal database. We checked each one.

The claim	What the FDA record shows
Great Value (Walmart) bottled water recall	No bottled water recall found. What is real is a Great Value apple juice recall in August 2024, Class II, for inorganic arsenic above the action level. Juice, not water, and easy to conflate.
Clover Valley (Dollar General) water recall	No water recall found. Real Clover Valley recalls exist for instant coffee (glass pieces, July 2025) and dairy items after a refrigeration failure. No water product.
Bottled water recall “in 6 states”	Real, and it is Meijer. Steam Distilled Water, 38,043 gallons, IL, IN, KY, OH, MI, WI, recalled November 2025 for a floating black substance. It has since been terminated.
Bottled water recalled for lead	No bottled water recall for lead exists. This refers to stainless steel children’s cups and bottles recalled by the CPSC in 2023 and 2024 for violating the federal lead content ban. It concerns the container, not the water.
2025 or 2026 E. coli bottled water recall	None found. Recent water recalls cite insanitary conditions, foreign objects, Pseudomonas and coliforms. The last confirmed E. coli event was Niagara Bottling in 2015, and even there E. coli was found at the spring source, not in finished bottles, which is why it was Class III.
Perrier recall	Not a US recall. French authorities ordered around 2 million bottles destroyed in 2024 after bacteria of faecal origin were found in a well near Nimes. That was a French regulatory action. Perrier does not appear in the FDA enforcement database.

The lead confusion is structural rather than accidental. A recall of a stainless steel bottle because the sealing dot at the base of its vacuum chamber contains lead is a CPSC action about the container. A recall of bottled water is an FDA action about what you drink. Search results blur the two constantly. Stanley is a common example: it faced lawsuits over lead in its sealing process, but its actual 2025 CPSC recall of 2.6 million travel mugs was for a burn hazard, not lead.

How do I check whether my bottle is affected?

Find the brand, not the store. Recalls name the bottler. A store brand is filled by a contract manufacturer, and that manufacturer is who appears in the FDA record.
Locate the lot code. On bottled water it is usually ink-jet printed on the shoulder or neck of the bottle, on the cap, or on the case wrap, not on the paper label. Real examples: Meijer printed “SELL BY OCT 04 2026” plus lot 39-222 #3; Waiakea used codes like WB123275.
Match every published identifier. Bottle UPC and case UPC are often different and both get published. Fiji had one of each.
Check the code info field. If a recall says “All Codes”, as Valley Springs does, no code check will clear your product.
Check the distribution states. If the product was never shipped to your state, it is very unlikely to be yours.
Search the source directly at the FDA enforcement report database.

What should I do if I have a recalled product?

Stop using it. Do not drink it, and do not use it for cooking, ice, formula, or pets. Valley Springs includes a pet water product, so that last one is not hypothetical.

Do not judge by appearance. FDA guidance in the Meijer case was explicit that consumers should not use the water even where no contamination is visible.

Full refund or replacement at the point of purchase is the standard remedy and was offered in the Meijer and Valley Springs cases. Receipts are usually not required for food recalls. Contact the recalling firm for the official terms, since the firm sets them rather than the store.

You do not need to have the water tested. The recall notice is already the finding, and consumer test kits will not detect the sanitation failures that trigger this kind of recall.

Why are bottled water recalls so rare?

Partly because the product is simple, and partly because of how it is monitored.

Bottled water is regulated by the FDA as a packaged food under 21 CFR 165.110, which sets standards of quality and identity. Tap water is regulated separately by the EPA under the Safe Drinking Water Act. The FDA is required to keep bottled water standards compatible with EPA’s, but it may also decide a given standard is not necessary for bottled water, which means the two rulebooks can diverge.

The allowable limits in 21 CFR 165.110 include arsenic at 10 ppb, bromate at 10 ppb, and lead at 5 ppb, which is actually stricter than EPA’s 15 ppb tap action level. If E. coli is present, the water is deemed adulterated outright.

Testing frequency is where the difference becomes concrete. Under 21 CFR 129.80, a bottler must test finished product for total coliform at least once a week, and for chemical, physical and radiological contaminants at least annually. A large municipal system tests far more often and must publish an annual Consumer Confidence Report sent to every customer. Bottlers keep their records for FDA inspection but face no equivalent publication requirement.

So the low recall count reflects a genuinely low-risk product, and it also reflects lighter, self-conducted, unpublished monitoring. Both are true at once.

How do I get alerted to new recalls?

The FDA publishes recalls, market withdrawals and safety alerts at fda.gov, with free email subscription through its Stay Informed page. For water bottles and other containers, the separate CPSC database is at cpsc.gov/Recalls. We re-check the enforcement database and update this page when the record changes.

Frequently asked questions

What bottled water is recalled right now?

Valley Springs Artesian Gold products, recalled February 6, 2026, covering 651,148 units of natural bottled water, distilled water, fluoride-added water, infant water and pet water. Distribution was limited to Illinois and Wisconsin. It is Class II and still listed as ongoing. No national brand is currently under an active recall.

Was Great Value water recalled?

No. There is no Great Value bottled water recall in the FDA enforcement database. What is real is a Great Value apple juice recall in August 2024, Class II, for inorganic arsenic above the action level. That is juice, not water.

Has Fiji water been recalled?

It was, in March 2024, covering 78,533 cases or roughly 1.9 million bottles sold through Amazon. The reason was manganese plus three unnamed bacterial genera. It was Class III, the lowest risk tier, and the recall terminated in November 2024. Fiji is not currently recalled.

Which bottled water was recalled in 6 states?

Meijer Steam Distilled Water, recalled November 2025 for a floating black foreign substance. It covered 38,043 gallons across Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Michigan and Wisconsin. The recall was Class II and terminated in March 2026.

Is a Class II recall dangerous?

Class II is the middle tier. The FDA defines it as a situation where use may cause temporary or medically reversible health consequences, or where the probability of serious consequences is remote. It is worth acting on, but it is not the serious-harm category, which is Class I.

Has any bottled water ever been a Class I recall?

Yes, once in the modern record. Real Water was recalled in March 2021 after the FDA was notified of cases of acute liver failure. Five Nevada children were hospitalised. Laboratory analysis never identified the causative contaminant, and the company ceased operations under a consent decree.

Can I get a refund for recalled bottled water?

Usually yes. Full refund or replacement at the point of purchase is the standard remedy, and receipts are typically not required for food recalls. Contact the recalling firm for the official terms, since the firm sets them rather than the retailer.

Who recalls bottled water, the FDA or the EPA?

The FDA. Bottled water is regulated as a packaged food under 21 CFR 165.110. The EPA regulates public tap water systems under the Safe Drinking Water Act. Water bottle containers are a third category handled by the Consumer Product Safety Commission. The USDA has no role.

Why does my search show water bottles recalled for lead?

That refers to reusable containers, not drinking water. Several stainless steel children’s cups were recalled by the CPSC in 2023 and 2024 for violating the federal lead content ban, where lead sits in the sealing dot at the base of the vacuum chamber. No bottled water has been recalled for lead.

Was Perrier recalled?

Not in the United States. French authorities ordered around 2 million Perrier bottles destroyed in 2024 after bacteria of faecal origin were found in a well near Nimes. That was a French regulatory action, and Perrier does not appear in the FDA enforcement database.

How often is bottled water tested compared with tap water?

Less often. Under 21 CFR 129.80, bottlers test finished product for total coliform at least weekly and for chemical, physical and radiological contaminants at least annually. Large municipal systems test far more frequently and must publish an annual Consumer Confidence Report. Bottlers face no equivalent publication requirement.

Does a recall mean the water made people sick?

Not necessarily. Many recalls are precautionary and begin with a failed inspection or an internal test result rather than reported illness. The Valley Springs recall cites insanitary bottling conditions, which is a facility finding. No illnesses were reported in the Meijer case either.

Sources

FDA openFDA food enforcement API. Recall records H-0534-2026, H-0535-2026, H-0536-2026 (event 98410); H-0408-2026 (Meijer); H-0048-2025 (Topo Chico); F-0123-2025 (Berkeley Springs); F-1264-2024 (Fiji); F-1117-2024 (Waiakea); F-1422-2023 (Zephyrhills); F-0481-2021 (Real Water); F-2958-2015 (Niagara).
FDA, Recalls Background and Definitions; Recalls, Market Withdrawals and Safety Alerts.
21 CFR 7.3, recall classification definitions.
21 CFR 165.110, bottled water standards of identity and quality.
21 CFR 129.80, processing and bottling requirements including testing frequency.
CDC HAN 00441, acute non-viral hepatitis associated with an alkaline water product.
CPSC recall database, stainless steel children’s drinkware lead content recalls, 2023 to 2024.